Nothing is immune to downsizing in these tough economic times — not even subatomic particles. New measurements published in the July 8 Nature suggest that the proton has a radius about 4 percent smaller than previously thought.

The result could just be a mistake. But if confirmed, a smaller proton could have enormous implications, scientists say.

“If this result holds up there’s something drastically wrong,” says Jeff Flowers of the National Physical Laboratory in England.

It could be that there’s a problem with quantum electrodynamics, a major unifying theory that’s been called the jewel of physics. QED basically describes how light and matter interact by incorporating Einstein’s special relativity into the realm of quantum mechanics.

“That opens the door for a major advancement in theory,” Flowers says.

To get the new measurements, a team led by Randolf Pohl of the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics in Garching, Germany, created an exotic form of hydrogen in which the atom’s lone electron is replaced by a particle known as a muon. Muons have the same charge as electrons but are about 200 times heavier, so they orbit much closer to the hydrogen atom’s nucleus. This coziness enhances the muon’s interaction with the proton at the atom’s center, allowing researchers to probe the proton in greater detail than they could with ordinary hydrogen.

In their experiments, the scientists aimed a beam of muons at hydrogen gas, creating muonic hydrogen. Whenever a muon was detected in the gas, the team fired a laser at the muon, hoping to bump it up to a higher energy level. Measuring the gap between the muon’s first and second energy levels — known as the Lamb shift — would allow the team to calculate the size of the proton’s radius.

Yet after years of fiddling with the muon beam and laser arrangements, the team still wasn’t having any luck. The laser had been tuned so that it could measure the proton’s radius if the value fell within the range of 0.87 to 0.91 femtometers, in line with QED. But by tuning the laser to work with a smaller proton, the team finally started seeing results. Their estimate of the proton’s radius: just over 0.84184 femtometers.

“There was no signal till the last three weeks before the experiment would have been stopped,” says study coauthor Aldo Antognini of the Paul Scherrer Institute in Villigen, Switzerland. “It was like in a Hollywood movie where everything goes bad till five minutes before the end.”

The new proton radius is 10 times more precise than previous estimates but well outside their range, which puzzles physicists.

“Presumably somebody made a mistake,” says Pohl. “But everybody’s convinced that nobody made a mistake, so it’s really intriguing. The measurements conflict with each other, but the question is now, how do you solve this problem?”

Physicists are already doing experiments with the hope of resolving the discrepancy, and theorists may have to revisit their numbers.

“Either one of the experiments is wrong, or the calculations are wrong,” says Pohl. “If it turns out that none of these is wrong, then one has to, maybe at some point in the far future, declare that QED is wrong, which would be really interesting. But we are not that far yet.”

“Living backwards!” Alice repeated in great
astonishment. “I never heard of such a thing!”
“—but there’s one great advantage in it, that one’s
memory works both ways.”
— Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass

August 15, 20103:01 am

Colesakick

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I trust the shrinkage is for real. We are entering the galactic north where the magnetic field is stronger than where our solar system has been for nearly 13,000 years. Earth is smaller too, according to new GPS studies. I have a paper defining magnetic fields in a new and fundamental way in terms of aether physics. You can read it for free on scribed, my name is Colleen Thomas, my work is discussed at http://www.youtube.com/colesakick as well.

August 20, 20108:37 pm

sandra

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Welcome to the vault colesakick 😛
I watched your main video, I'll take a glance at a bit more.

"Consciousness is never experienced in the plural, only in
the singular. How does the idea of plurality (emphatically
opposed by the Upanishad writers arise at all? .... the
only possible alternative is simply to keep the immediate
experience that consciousness is a singular of which the
plural is unkown; that there *is* only one thing and that
what seems to be a plurality is merely a series of different
aspects of this one thing produced by deception (the Indian
maya) - in much the same way Gaurisankar and Mt Everest turn
out to be the same peak seen from different valleys."

The galactic North .....
You know what color is associated with the North most often.
White.

“Come now and let us reason together,” says the Lord,
“Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.” (Isaiah 1:18)

"I looked, and there before me was a white horse! Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown, and he rode out as a conqueror bent on conquest."revelations

See where does this enlightment come from.
Where does this knowledge of being come from.

The information you indulge in is good stuff colesakick.
However there is a source, and a physical representation
of which provides. That is Christ. As a Christian there is no information
I have come upon in which I do not understand multidimensionally.
Yet there are absolute truths that are.
'One being', that there is a keeper to this reality, to all dimensions,
to all frequencies, to all minds, and to all bodies. Christ our lord, Amen. 😉

We need to understand that all things grow, all things change, perceptually.

When Christ returns, to see him as someting other than his physical body walking talking and breathing, does not mean he is not walking talking and breathing, Christ himself knows far more about being many places at once, if he didn't, science or no one simply could.

“Living backwards!” Alice repeated in great
astonishment. “I never heard of such a thing!”
“—but there’s one great advantage in it, that one’s
memory works both ways.”
— Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass

October 4, 201010:21 pm

mrmonsoon

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Forgive me, but 4% off is not a lot.

When you understand that Protons are too small to be directly seen with an eye and a microscope.

4% could easily be accounted for by a math error or a math equation error.

Personally, I think they are still the same size, we are just getting better and understanding the math behind them.
:geek:

October 4, 201011:30 pm

sandra

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"mrmonsoon" wrote: Forgive me, but 4% off is not a lot.

Not on a home depot sale,,,,No.
Talking proton, it is a slightly big deal and to be technical it is a 5.0 deviation.

When you understand that Protons are too small to be directly seen with an eye and a microscope.

4% could easily be accounted for by a math error or a math equation error.

Personally, I think they are still the same size, we are just getting better and understanding the math behind them.
:geek:

The instruments being used with observation were thought to have been
more accurate, so realistically, the people using the measuring instrument
were not accurate in what they were observing, typical in what you find
in Science.

“Living backwards!” Alice repeated in great
astonishment. “I never heard of such a thing!”
“—but there’s one great advantage in it, that one’s
memory works both ways.”
— Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass

October 21, 20103:22 am

SmokinJoe

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4% as a number or percentage is a small number,yes. However, that small number, theoretically, could declare QED is simply wrong (according to the article, not me). Interesting article.

One other thing I thought interesting was the timing of it all. Three weeks before they called it quits.

QED might just be safe for a bit longer.

Dawkins thinks belief in God is an excuse to evade thinking in the scientific world. Sadly, he is ignorant to the list of christian scientists who have contributed & founded many of the sciences he himself believes in. How ironic.

November 6, 201012:13 am

scientificmind

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Good point, my brother. Good to see ya again....glad you're still takin' names and kickin' *ss...scientificmind.

December 11, 201011:56 pm

Tairaa

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The instruments being used with observation were thought to have been
more accurate, so realistically, the people using the measuring instrument
were not accurate in what they were observing, typical in what you find
in Science.

I would just like to point out that precision and accuracy are entirely different.

Admitttedly I haven't read the article, and as such I'm unsure of the precision or accuracy of the instruments used. A follow up would be nice, I now wonder weither a proton is the same size I always thought it was or 4% smaller. 😛

Also, are neutrons smaller as well, seeing as they are made of the same stuff?

"George Bush says he speaks to god every day, and christians love him for it. If George Bush said he spoke to god through his hair dryer, they would think he was mad. I fail to see how the addition of a hair dryer makes it any more absurd."

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